Photography MA

The MA Photography programme at the RCA comprises a unique, cross-disciplinary community of artists and writers working at the cutting edge of contemporary photographic practice and image-making. We understand photography to be an expansive and evolving practice, which includes the still and moving image, publishing, performance, installation, social practice, sound, synthetic media, text, and writing. Central to our approach is the practising, theorising, and receiving of photography as a field unrestricted by the conventions of material, medium, format, discipline, and genre. Important to our programme ethos is a commitment to process to the unknown, indeterminate, speculative, and hybrid. We are committed to probing what the photographic image is, and could be, across contemporary art practices. From diverse perspectives we consider digital and analogue forms of photography in relation to socio-political debates, intercultural discourses, exchanges between theory and practice, and emerging modes of circulation and distribution. Driven by research-led teaching and state-of-the-art technical facilities, you will contribute to vital discussions about the future of the image today at an urgent time of ecological crisis and technological change impacted by questions of visibility and representation. Our faculty of artists, writers, and theorists will support you to develop your work into a critical, reflective, and professionally robust practice. Unique to your experience at the RCA will be the themed practice group that you will join at the start of the year. Each practice group is led by a faculty member emphasising communal learning and encouraging curiosity. The practice group is an invitation to push at the critical, conceptual, practical, and material possibilities of your research and practice in dialogue with others. You will attend to important aesthetic, theoretical, cultural, and historical contexts for your work.

Candidates are selected entirely on merit and applications are welcomed from all over the world. The selection process considers creativity, imagination and innovation as demonstrated in your portfolio, as well as your potential to benefit from the programme and to achieve high MA standards overall.

You are generally expected to have a good BA degree from a photography or fine art course. You should be able to demonstrate an original and critical approach to photography as well as an ability to engage with current theories of art and culture that inform your practice.